RICHMOND, British Columbia — Shani Davis did not finish on the medal platform yesterday, but he remained upbeat — a change from previous Olympics.

Davis finished 12th in the 5,000 meters, his first race at the Vancouver Games, but the result was not the most important thing for Davis in this race. The 27-year-old from Chicago is the favorite in the middle-distance races later this week. Yesterday’s race was a tune-up for those.

“I’m just itching,” Davis said of his anticipation for his next three races. “I can’t wait to go out there and try to do it.”

In the 5,000, Davis was paired with Sven Kramer, the world’s best in that distance. The 23-year-old from the Netherlands did not disappoint. He won the gold medal with an Olympic record time of 6:14.60. Davis’ time was 6:28.44.

The two were close for the first few laps, then Davis faded fast.

“I gave him a good run for it for about four or five laps but there were seven or six laps to go,” Davis said. “Typical Shani, I just hit the wall. It’s better now than later. It’s good to get this one out of the way.”

No American finished in the top 10. Chad Hedrick, the gold medalist in 2006, finished 11th and Trevor Marsicano was 14th. Seung-Hoon Lee of Korea took the silver and Ivan Skobrev of Russian got the bronze.

After dealing with controversy in his first two Olympics, Davis said he’s concentrating on having fun this time.

“I’m telling myself to keep on enjoying, enjoying, enjoying the Olympics,” he said. “I’ve had two Olympics that weren’t quite good for me. This time it’s a whole other story.”

Davis said people interact differently with him now than in the past and he’s seen a change in the media coverage of him.

“It’s a lot more positive than it was before,” he said.

Davis found himself embroiled in controversy in each of his last two Olympics. In 2002, then trying to make the Games in short-track, people accused his friend Apolo Ohno of letting him win to qualify for the games. Four years later, having shifted to long-track, a spat with U.S. teammate Hedrick blew up into one of the major stories of the Turin Games.

Davis has not done much to improve his image. He did very few interviews leading up to Vancouver and makes himself a separate entity from U.S. Speedskating. He asked to be removed from their media guide.

In Turin, things got ugly early for Davis when Hedrick criticized him for sitting out the team pursuit. Davis was viewed as selfish and the controversy overshadowed anything he did on the ice.

This time around Davis is sitting out the team pursuit again, opting to concentrate on the four individual races.

Kramer is the most dominant distance skater in the world. He has won three straight world all-around titles, as well as three straight single distance titles in the 5,000 meters and 10,000 meters. He is a huge celebrity in the Netherlands, where speedskating is insanely popular.